


In the Flesh

by Kuebikonism



Category: Coco (2017)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Guilt, Introspection, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-30
Updated: 2019-05-30
Packaged: 2020-03-29 17:34:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19024666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kuebikonism/pseuds/Kuebikonism
Summary: Light AU: When skeletons cross over the Marigold Bridge, for one day, they regain the bodies they had in their previous lives.Héctor sees himself in the flesh for the first time in a hundred years. Imelda wonders.





	In the Flesh

**Author's Note:**

> No beta, no spellcheck, written in one go at 1am. Let’s go.

Over time, Día de Muertos has become just another tradition for her, but Imelda knows as well as the rest of her family that this one is more than just any yearly visit to the living.

It’s been a year since the fiasco with Ernesto, and Imelda still worries about Héctor’s first experience crossing the Marigold Bridge. She’s denied him this experience for so long - guilt is definitely one of the emotions she’s feeling, though she hates to asmit it - that she wonders how he’d handle the experience. Passing the ofrenda check, crossing the bridge itself, seeing the living descendants -

And of course, the renewal of their bodies.

Imelda feels the familiar sensation of flesh as it slowly coats around her bones. She’s done this dozens of times before, so it’s no surprise to her when the blood flows into her body, travelling upwards and rushing straight into her head. She staggers slightly, closing her eyes - she’ll never get used to that sensation - but when she stands again, she feels as alive as the day she died. She can feel the light wrinkles in her skin, her slightly sunken eyes, but they’re no more than reminders of a time when age mattered. She’s long since moved past the silly trivialities of age, she thinks; even before she died, she’d ignored it, and skeletons don’t shrivel with time anyhow. 

Opening her eyes, she catches the sight of Héctor just as he crosses the border, stepping cautiously onto the glowing petals as if he doesn’t quite feel like he belongs there. Something stirs deep within her chest. She wonders if it’s expectation (her heart is inexplicably pounding), but her eyes remain fixated on him as Día de Muertos begins to work its magic.

As she watches, the trails of living, breathing skin spiral around his arms, working their way up his skeletal form. It’s faster for him than it is for her, and the childish idea pops into her head that perhaps his body has missed being together. Imelda pushes the thought away and continues to watch. It’s hardly been an instant, but her husband’s transformation is done in a flash. Héctor seems stunned, his hectic locks covering the majority of his face, and the rush of blood to his head nearly sends him toppling to the ground. Panic grasps at her and Imelda rushes to his side, momentarily casting aside her pride as she catches him just before he hits the ground. Her reputation as a matriarch, she’s come to find, is second only to the love she’s found again for her husband. Worried, she brushes the bangs from his face as Coco runs towards them, her now-restored brothers and the rest of the family hot on her tail. 

Héctor sits up with a jolt just as Coco reaches his side, turning towards her and letting her fall into his embrace. It’s then that Imelda gets a good look at him, his youthful features, and she staggers back in surprise. Her first thought is the same one she’d had when she’d first seen him after waking up as a skeleton - too young. 

Héctor looks exactly like the young man in the photo on the ofrenda, a daydreaming musician of no more than twenty-one years, still lanky and awkward-looking, not a single gray hair or wrinkle. He looked exactly as she’d last seen him before he left - was murdered, she corrects herself. The rage in her chest cools into an emptiness she can’t describe as he turns to face her. His eyes are bright with youthful energy, and he seems shocked into silence at seeing himself. Imelda suddenly feels sick to her stomach.

“Imelda, you didn’t tell me about... about... all of this!” Héctor gestures excitedly at himself, marveling at his renewed form. Imelda has a strong inkling he’s referring to the experience itself; Héctor’s been nervous about being ‘renewed’ for the past week, and it takes several bouts of lighthearted banter to coax him towards the identification gates. Either he doesn’t notice the lines of wrinkles and stress carved into her aging face, or he pretends not to, for her sake. Imelda feels the shame of self-consciousness burning a hole in the back of her head, but her guilt thankfully crushes it into something more manageable. She’s spent the past year trying to repair the hundred years of loneliness and self-hatred burned into her husband’s soul, but seeing him as he was in life is a harsh dose of reality driven like a stake into her heart. As much as she tries to harden her heart, Hector seems to find some way to melt it all over again. 

“Don’t tell me you didn’t learn what happened when you crossed over in the hundred years you’ve been here, Héctor.” Imelda says sternly, trying to keep the guilt from leaking into her words. Héctor laughs, and Imelda suddenly feels like she’s seeing him for the first time again, back when they were teenagers with nothing but love on their minds. She remembers thinking he was handsome - spindly limbs and all - and his laughing face inadvertently brings her back to the days of their youth, back to the young woman she was. Back to the man she’d married and loved.

“Ah, give me a break, mi amor. I’m but a free-spirited young man...” Héctor grins. Imelda forces a look of exasperation at his joke, but internally she can feel the guilt creeping up into her renewed windpipe. 

Twenty-one. God, her own great-granddaughter is thirty-eight. Oscar and Felipe were in their sixties, Julio was seventy-two, Victoria was forty-six, and she herself is comfortably into her seventies. It’s strange to think about, but even stranger when the proof is right before her eyes. 

Their family members are surrounding them now, and she can feel the unspoken tension in the air - her husband is notably younger than all of them, and though that fact’s been painfully obvious from the start, actually seeing it is an entirely different situation. Héctor is seemingly quick to pick up on it as well. He gets to his feet, cautiously allowing Coco to support him, before making a vague statement about how Miguel would be there and how they shouldn’t keep him waiting. Coco, ironically, looks the least concerned out of anyone, and helps her father up with the same brightness she‘d embodied during their teary reunion. Without meeting anyone’s eyes, she and Hector hobble away (with Héctor doing most of the hobbling, courtesy of his unhealed limp). 

Imelda just stares after him, a mix of suppressed emotions swirling in her mind. She becomes consciously aware of the concerned stares of her relatives, and resists the urge to snap at them. It works for about two seconds.

“What are you all waiting for? You heard him! Miguel’s waiting for you!” Taking the hint, her family scatters to head off towards the living realm. Her brothers turn around to stare at her once more before her glare sends them off again, leaving her alone in the petals. 

Imelda sinks to her knees, feeling strange and confused. Love, which has been sliding back into her walled heart after all these years, overwhelms her and inexplicably gives her a feeling of drowning. She knows Héctor’s love for her is powerful enough to weather her continued rejections, but a nagging sense of self-doubt and guilt seems to drag her deeper into the petals below her feet. Past everything else hidden deep within the petals is a feeling that scares her above all else, a feeling that she has kept hidden for a hundred years; nostalgia. The desire to go back to that fateful year, back when they were young lovers, to redo everything, no matter how differently things would have gone. Its unpredictability scares her, but she’s been running from it for so long that she can feel it catching up with her; she feels tired. Scared.

Knee-deep in the petals, Imelda’s stony facade begins to crack. Covering her face with her hands, she feels droplets of something forming in the corners of her eyes, and hopes no one is watching.

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know if I botched the Spanish...


End file.
